Chapter 4 - The Dangerous Truth
“You think I brought you here to punish you for Evan?” Vincent asked, setting his glass down with a faint clink on the wooden side table. He stood up slowly, towering over me in the confined space of the library.
“In your world, people don’t walk away from public humiliation unscathed,” I said, backing up a step until my shoulders brushed against the heavy oak door.
Vincent closed the distance between us with measured, predatory steps. When he stopped, he was close enough that I could smell the faint trace of cedar and tobacco on his tailored suit. “My world is governed by rules, Claire. But you stopped playing by corporate rules the moment you looked me in the eye and confessed you wanted me.”
My breath hitched. “I was angry. I was cornered.”
“Were you lying?” he asked, his voice dropping to a dangerous, low purr.
I looked up into his hardened features, searching for any sign of mockery, but found only a raw, terrifying honesty that matched my own. “No,” I whispered, the word escaping before I could trap it back behind my teeth.
Vincent let out a long, ragged breath—a sound that carried the weight of three years of suppressed desire, late-night surveillance, and corporate restraint. “Do you have any idea how hard it was to watch my son hand you a ring that belonged to a woman I never truly loved, knowing that the only woman I’ve wanted for a decade was sitting across the boardroom table from me?”
Before I could process his words, Vincent’s hand came up, his fingers gently brushing against my cheekline with a tenderness that completely dismantled my defenses. “Evan is young, and he’ll heal. He’ll find someone who fits his world. But you and I? We built this empire together from the ground up, brick by brick. You think I was going to let you disappear just because my family drama got messy?”
“Your son hates me,” I reminded him, my voice trembling.
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“My son is licking his wounds in Europe for the summer, growing up like he should have years ago,” Vincent corrected smoothly. “And as for my fatherly duties—they don't include handing over the woman who keeps my entire life from collapsing.”
He leaned in closer, his lips brushing against my ear. “You broke my world apart, Claire. Now you have to help me put it back together.”
